Quatre´s Birthday Bash
by Laia Moon
Summary: Quatre decides to throw a party for apparently no reason at all. All of the pilots are invited. Randomness ensues. A story that I wrote way back when. I fixed it up a bit, and decided to post it.


Disclaimer: Gundam Wing is not mine. It will never be mine either, no matter how many times I ask Santa for it in my yearly Christmas presents. I know it because he personally sent me a letter telling me to off and stop sending him letters that always asked for the same thing. In the after note, he asked me if I didn't think I was getting a bit too old to be writing him letters anymore.

Warning: None at all. Except if you count randomness as potentially dangerous. If that is the case, beware!!

Pairings: None, since it is supposed to be a romance fic. But if you press me, I'll say 1xR and 4xR (one-sided and obsessive.)

AN: This is a revamp of a fanfic I wrote way back when, years and years ago. I found it on a floppy disk and it brought back memories to me. So, I decided to post it. When I read it, however, I thought: "Seriously, this sounds like a 15-year old doing the writing!" Guess what? I _was_ 15 when I wrote this, so it's not what you would call a particularly good fanfic, in my opinion. I still wanted to post it, so I fixed it up a bit and…here it is! I hope its randomness can at least minimally amuse you.

**(Quatre's) Birthday Bash**

There. He'd finished writing the invitations. They were all written on the nicest paper he could find—being the multimillionaire that he was, that meant really nice—and in his coolest, twisty handwriting. He had asked the store for some customized paper. He had bought five different types, and in industrial quantities. He clearly intended to write a lot of letters to someone. You see, Quatre was one of those people whose opinion was that _everyone_ loved letters. And, since he aimed to please, he sent at least two letters a week to all of his favorite people. Never mind that he was supposed to be organizing and directing a world-and-colony-wide business inherited from his father—_there were letters to write!_ The Maganacs had their hands full trying to get him to do something useful. It seemed that the war and death of his father had had some….adverse….effect upon his personality.

Quatre reviewed the types of paper he had bought yet again. They were arranged into two-feet-high stacks, and according to the person they were meant for. Quatre had so much time that he could literally spend _hours_ deliberating on how to customize this or that piece of stationary. It was his latest hobby, after all.

In the first stack was Relena's custom-designed paper. It was baby pink, and had roses and teddy bears on it. Duo's paper was bright orange and had little jokes (all of them quite corny) at the bottom of each sheet. While staring at Relena's stack, Quatre decided that he might order some pink paper for himself. After all—it matched his outfit perfectly!

The next three paper patterns had been hard to choose. Trowa's paper was a light green and had an exact copy of Trowa's half-mask as its border. Every one or two pages, a flute pattern was added to the border. Quatre hadn't been sure about what to put on Heero's paper. He had changed so much—! From an emotionless assassin to a pilot who was slowly learning to accept himself as a person, and not just a soldier. The final result: a baby blue background with a border pattern that alternated guns and pictures of Relena—Relena smiling, Relena walking, Relena giving a speech... Quatre really envied Heero—he had such a drop-dead gorgeous girlfriend! All the while, he was stuck with Dorothy and her evil forked eyebrows. Now that he thought about it, Relena wasn't anything out of this world, really, and she wasn't Heero's girlfriend either—but anything was better than Eyebrow Woman!

The last stack contained papers for writing to Wufei. He rarely answered when written to, but when he did, he sounded nice and sincere, different from his stiff social persona. Since Wufei had shown a preference for simple backgrounds, Quatre had chosen a plain white one. At the top of each page, there were the words "justice, integrity, honor" in Chinese, printed in black ink. Quatre had finally found a use for that English-Chinese dictionary that his great-aunt Edna had given him years ago. Who would have thought? He really had to get around to thanking her sometime.

All of the other pilots—and Relena, of course—had matching envelopes to go with their paper. So, Quatre stuck an invitation—along with a long letter—into each separate envelope. He then put a stamp on each of the "cute" envelopes. Afterwards, he decided to go mail them at the mailbox—but the Maganacs only let him go as far as his own personal mailbox, right on the edge of his property.

_Oh well_, Quatre thought, _at least they'll get there safely. I hope_.

---------------------

Two days later, both Relena and the other pilots received a letter and invitation from Quatre. When her personal secretary brought in the envelope with Quatre´s letter and invitation (quite obviously a product of his latest stationary craze), Relena felt like sending it back out of sheer mortification. One or two of the pilots had similar thoughts, but in the end decided to do nothing—after all, this was Quatre they were thinking about. _Surely _he hadn't _meant_ to send letters on such ridiculous paper….had he?

The letters that they each received were different from each other, though they all retained the Dear, sweet Quatre" quality that they had all come to dread…..ahem…._love_. The invitations were all the same, though. Written in Quatre´s best handwriting, they read:

Dear ,

I'm really happy to announce that there will be a birthday party on September 31st at my mansion. You're invited to come see me at my mansion. I don't want anyone to bring presents—I'll provide them. We'll have a gift exchange. Please come, the party will start at six o'clock in the afternoon. We'll have lots of fun! Everyone will be invited. Don't miss out.

_Quatre Raberba Winner_

All the pilots (and Relena) decided to go to the party. Duo wanted to go because he would probably get the chance to pig out. Relena wanted to go in case Heero went. Trowa felt that he owed loyalty to his friend Quatre, and had to go. Wufei decided to go because—well, because he felt like it, and he had been invited, after all. Heero decided to go because he wanted to personally correct Quatre's mistake on his stationery (he wanted more pictures of Relena, and he was sure that Quatre could get him some), and because he wanted to see Relena somewhere other than on a piece of paper. They'd have to kill a thousand puppies and kittens in front of his eyes, though, before he admitted that. And event then, he'd answer evasively.

------------------------------

The ex-gundam pilots and current war heroes arrived at the mansion at exactly the same time. Relena arrived about two minutes later—at 5:59 P.M. At six P.M. on the dot, they all lined up in front of the door and rang the doorbell. It rang with the tune of "happy birthday"—ding-dong-ding ding ding dong ding-dong-ding ding ding dong. By the time the butler opened the door, they were all sporting varied expressions: Relena one of mortified embarrassment, Trowa of eternal patience, Heero one of utter boredom, Duo of barely-contained laughter…while Wufei just looked like he regretted ever having decided to come and was searching for the most probable escape route.

"Hello. You must be Master Quatre's famous friends. Do come in." the butler deadpanned, "Please follow me. I shall take you to the party room."

They all followed the butler as though they were zombies: lined up and in complete and utter silence. Every once in a while, though, a chain reaction started: Relena stared into Heero's eyes and sighed. To this Duo responded with a snicker. Wufei rolled his eyes, exasperated by both Duo and Relena's behavior. Trowa, as usual, didn't comment. Rinse and repeat. After what seemed like an hour of walking (that time estimation could have been accurate, as far as they knew—with Quatre´s mansions you had to "expect the unexpected"), the butler stopped.

"This is the party room." He murmured, and after gesturing towards the double-doors, he grabbed and pushed them open.

One of the strangest sights in the known world (colonies included) met their eyes. The room they had just walked into had a pink rug and a maroon sofa—rather, _one_ of the sofas was maroon. There were several. Quatre had been sitting on that particular sofa, but upon seeing them, he jumped high in the air—a surprising height, to Wife's amazement—and shouted,

"Yay! You're here!"

There _were_ some other tables and chairs in the room (presumably, they had the food and beverages) located near one of the room's corners. The chairs were pink, along with the party favors and tablecloth. There were decorations strung on the wall—they were pink and white too—and a big banner saying, "Welcome back!"

The only things that had escaped Quatre's "perfect pink" attack (the idea had been conceived after mailing Relena's letter, if you can remember) were the party hats and their respective owners. Each party hat was printed with the pilot's respective stationary patterns. Quatre had even made _himself_ a hat. It was lavender and had small violins decorating it. The pilots and Relena's responses to the room's decorations were varied.

"Um, original?" supplied Heero.

"OK." mumbled Trowa, trying not to shudder. Quatre was his _friend_, after all. He had to be _nice_ to his friends. Running away screaming in an uncharacteristic display of horror wasn't considered nice at all.

"Are we in the wrong room?" asked Duo bluntly.

"Absolutely perfect!" squealed Relena, jumping up and down. Obviously, she either loved pink, was colorblind, or had appalling taste. Perhaps all three things—one does not rule out the other, after all.

"…" Wufei struggled to come up with an appropriate comment, but came up with none.

"You'rehereyou'rehereyou'rehere!" shrieked Quatre in return.

"Later we can look for hidden presents when we go on a treasure hunt in my smaller garden." He continued, "Why don't you put your party hats on? Why not start the gift exchange now? Or do you prefer food first?"

"Food!" shouted Duo enthusiastically. He had been eyeing the tables since…well…let's just say that he had located them 2.5 seconds after entering the room, despite some of them being blocked by horrendously tacky orange potted plants.

"Gift exchange!" shouted the others, with varying degrees of enthusiasm, while putting their party hats on.

While Duo raided the food table, grabbing bowls and filling them with chips, candy, and a ton of other delicious junk food –upon seeing the chocolate donuts, Wufei decided that one day of not keeping his rigorous training-diet would be alright— the others gathered around Quatre.

With a couple of swift gestures, he set Heero, Relena, and Trowa writing numbers on slips of paper (there were twenty-four gifts).

Quatre snapped his fingers once, dramatically. Wufei tensed in expectation. Nothing happened. Another try. Another. Finally, annoyed (his grandiose display had just been ruined), he just rang the regular bell. His loyal army of Maganacs came marching in, carrying the presents. While some carried, others pointed and organized where the presents should be stacked. The end result was several _very_ high stacks of presents.

When everything was ready, Quatre passed out the slips of paper, having shuffled them well first. Duo then passed out the food (one BIG bowl per person, full of all sorts of goodies) and put the drinks on a nearby table, which had been dragged over by Heero for that purpose.

"Duo, after watching you bravely juggle the drinks and food, especially without dropping any, I have decided to ask you to join the circus. Will you accept?" this well-meant comment from Trowa lightened the I'm-kind of-embarrassed-of-being-here-in-a-pink-room mood.

"Nah," responded Duo, slightly flushed from the exercise, "it only seems to work with food. I certainly can't juggle apples and bananas at the circus, can I? It wouldn't be impressive. It would be even worse if I tried to juggle ice cream—so messy!"

"Actually," interrupted Quatre, "that _could_ work. But anyway, let's get started with the exchange, OK? Who has number one? Oh, and remember, a gift can only be stolen twice. There is trading only _after_ the exchange had finished. Remember, Wufei, stealing gifts in this game _is_ _acceptable_. In fact, it's the point. No dishonor, curses or random voodoo incantations will fall upon the thief. Got it?"

"I already knew that, Quatre." Wufei hotly answered, not bothering to hide his glare, "When I was little, I played this game. That was how I won my first toy sword…I'm not inexperienced. Don't treat me like a child!"

"_I _have number one." Heero's voice cut into the argument (about to become a fistfight) neatly.

Heero then sauntered towards the giant pile of presents, under Quatre and Wufei's astonished gazes. Out of the pile of presents, he took a medium-sized one that was wrapped in—what else? —pink paper. He walked back over to his seat and opened it. It was a cute, adorable teddy bear. Relena was second, so she stole it. Heero got another present, and it turned out to be a hairbrush and a bottle of shampoo (with NEW apple scent!). Duo, as third, stole that, muttering something about apple scent and dating girls.

And so the gift exchange progressed. Wufei stole a lot, and Heero was stolen from the most often. He managed to contain himself (he _really_ wanted to get a gun and shoot them for being so thieving—especially Duo), though, after Relena gave him one of her melting smiles. Thus the purpose of having invited Relena to the party was revealed: to keep Heero from grabbing a bazooka while in a rage and trying to kill them all.

Everyone ended up with four presents. Duo got the hairbrush and shampoo, a joke book, some tie-dyed hair scrunchies, and a handy dandy "Braid Care" kit. Relena got two teddy bears, a bookstore gift certificate (worth $50), and a rose diary. Trowa received a bucket of hair gel (ten pounds), a stuffed tiger (as in stuffed toy, not a live one that had just eaten), a flute-cleaning kit, and, of course, an extra clown mask (two, if you count the way Trowa hacks his masks into two and later wears only half of one).

Everyone, either by trading or stealing, finally got the presents he or she wanted. Heero got a giant picture of Relena (he had to fight Quatre for it. It was a quite vicious and yet pathetic fight), a frame to put it in, a travel bag (which he used later), and a book called _Calm Yourself. What to do when you want to commit suicide,_ which he confusedly rifled through. Wufei got a cool machete, a vat of hair gel (ten pounds too, just like Trowa), some new training slippers and a book called _Train Yourself. A self-instructing guide to inner meditation._

Quatre's presents were kind of strange. He got a violin case, which had a flower pattern engraved on it. Another of his presents was a picture frame, which was pink and purple. He also got a group picture of the pilots (with Relena, of course) so that he could put it in his frame. He was the last person to get his fourth (and final) present, so he got a present that he really could gloat about. It was a giant, larger than life-sized poster of Relena ("I customized it myself." Quatre told them).

"Ha! Take that Heero! _I_ got the giant, life-sized poster of Relena, and you didn't!" he gloated. Gloating really didn't become him. Had something happened to him during the war that the other pilots hadn't heard about? He was certainly acting strange.

"Give it to me, now!" shouted Heero, pointing a finger (did you expect a gun? All of them, supposedly, were confiscated at the entrance. Twenty guns were found on Heero alone. If he can do that wearing spandex bike shorts, imagine what he could do with _normal_ clothes!) at Quatre. Relena blushed and watched with embarrassment as Quatre and Heero grappled over the possession of the poster.

The rest of the pilots, with the exception of Duo (who was too busy wolfing down some éclairs), decided to go on a treasure hunt while Quatre and Heero were still fighting. Relena went with them too. She was starting to worry about those two— "those two" being the two beings currently rolling around on the floor, pulling at each other's hair. She refused to call them "people".

Duo sat down on Extremely Pink Couch #2 and grabbed a bowl of popcorn, not able to believe that the others were going to miss seeing Quatre _actually_ fight. He followed their movements with his eyes as they rolled across the floor.

---------------------

Later, when the others came back in (ten bowls and a half of popcorn later), Quatre and Heero were still at it. So, they all decided to sit down and watch.

_You know_, Relena thought_, all that rolling around on the floor is quite suggestive. I'm sure I could find some fangirls to sell footage of this to. I bet I'd make a fortune._

When she looked in Duo's direction, he discreetly palmed the video camera he was holding in his lap and made a thumb up signal at her.

Relena Peacecraft, good girl extraordinaire, as well as ambassador, silently covered her currently not-such-a-good-girl-now smile. She couldn't wait to see the footage. And if they edited it a little bit, who would notice or care, really?

Hours later, when Relena and the pilots were leaving, they all said goodbye to a battered-looking Quatre. Heero was clutching the Relena poster possessively. He looked stubborn and obstinate, like an overgrown (and very petulant) child clutching at a favorite toy. Heero looked ready to fight anyone who dared to try to take the poster away, even after all those hours of fighting. The butler tried to console a nearly crying Quatre.

"Don't worry, Master Quatre, we have a copy of that poster." Upon hearing this, Quatre visibly brightened.

"Well, hope to see you soon!" were the last words that he issued from his mouth before he slammed his door shut in their faces. Relena suppressed a frown. _He's probably running off to take a look at that poster_, she thought. Upon thinking of the video Duo had filmed, though, her countenance brightened. _Ah well. I've got something of his too. And I bet I'll make more money off it._

"There's a moral to this story." Duo chuckled as he revealed it, "Never get between Heero and anything that has Relena's face on it."

As they walked away from Quatre's mansion, they all laughed at Duo's comment. Even Wufei laughed! (But Heero didn't laugh... He just clutched his poster even tighter, and looked at everyone around him with shifty, suspicious eyes.)

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AN: So, what do you think? Yea? Nay? Please review. Squees are much-loved. Constructive criticism is appreciated and will be acted upon (in due time); flames will be ignored.


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